The draft's immigration section, titled "Supporting Humane and Legal Immigration," backs the president's case for giving some illegal aliens temporary legal status under a guest-worker program, a position vehemently opposed by immigration-control forces in the party.

"A growing economy requires a growing number of workers, and President Bush has proposed a new temporary workers program to match willing foreign workers with willing U.S. employers, when no Americans can be found to fill the jobs.

"[The Bush/Fox Amnesty] would allow workers who currently hold jobs to come out of the shadows and to participate legally in America's economy..."

The draft language goes on to say that the plan "would allow men and women who enter the program to apply for citizenship in the same manner as those who apply from outside the United States."

The draft repeats [Bush's Orwellian claim that his program isn't an amnesty], saying flatly that the proposal "does not grant amnesty, which we oppose, because it would have the effect of encouraging illegal immigration and would give an unfair advantage to those who have broken our laws."

In addition to scoring big points against Bush's inability to provide border security, Kerry could also score big points about Bush's attempts to allow the world to bid on American jobs. See this post:

"We do envision that [the Bush/Fox guest worker program] would be open to any type of employee and any type of employer, such as nurses, teachers, high-tech workers, low-skilled workers. This is a concept that can apply broadly" [Bush's assistant said]

Can't you just hear Kerry saying, "President Bush wants to put American jobs on eBay and see who can provide the lowest bid..."

Migration of that kind would be very bad for the economy, and peculiarly bad for the investment in machinery and methods which result in less labor used for a given task. Weinstein and Davis, at Columbia, have given solutions of Ricardo's equations which show that migration to the more productive country will continue until it is pushed all the way down to the world average. The money will flow towards the less productive countries, financing also the flow of immigrants, and the way it tends to equalize them is mainly by reducing the productivity in the richer country. Essentially, labor-saving capital is displaced more and more, in order to use all the available labor. To displace capital in this process, means to scrap it or tear it down. The value of businesses consists in their investments of this productivity-enhancing kind, not in their ability to substitute menials for machinery. The world average is around 80% down from where we are now.